Antoinette de Crombrugghe, MA Degree Candidate at the Columbia Climate School, reflects on New York City's Climate Clock and how cultural symbols might shape the ways we pay attention to — and act on — climate.

THE NEW YORK CLIMATE CLOCK

I belong to a generation raised in the shadow of the climate crisis. But it wasn’t something we were taught in school. It wasn’t part of our curriculum, our standardized tests, our childhood vocabulary. We came across it slowly, in fragments, through social media, activism, panic headlines, and documentaries. We educated ourselves. We connected the dots. And still, many of us are figuring out how to carry this knowledge and how to live with it without being crushed by it.

Earlier this year, I wrote an article for Weave News about the Climate Clock at New York City's Union Square. I had passed by the clock many times, always noticing the massive red digits blinking above the Square, but never quite stopping to let it all in. It was only when I considered writing about it that I gave myself permission to pause. To stand beneath it, look up, and let the weight of what it represents settle into my chest. When researching my article, the numbers read four years and 138 days. Now, as I sit down to write this reflection, we are already down to four years and 78.

The Climate Clock arrived in Union Square in 2020. Based on calculations by the Mercator Research Institute on Global Commons and Climate Change in Berlin, the clock indicates the time remaining before the planet reaches 1.5 °C of global warming, given current emissions trends. In 2021, a second set of numbers was added to the clock to indicate the increasing percentage of the world’s energy that comes from renewables.

To prepare my article, I visited Union Square regularly over the course of several days. I observed how people were responding to the clock and spoke with over thirty people who happened to be walking through the Square. My goal was to understand how this public installation was being received by these passersby. I was curious about climate anxiety, and I wondered whether a ticking clock could shake a passerby out of their routine and into climate consciousness.

On a bright Saturday in late February, I was back at my usual Union Square watching spot. The air was still sharp with winter, the sky clear and cold. The Greenmarket was unfolding in quiet, familiar rhythms. Union Square is an urban space that feels different depending on the season. But that day, there was a stillness to it. Vendors lined the pathways between sparse naked trees, nature reaching skyward as if trying to catch its breath amid the city’s steady hum. People stopped to admire sunflowers or rummage through old teapots. There was something tender about placing extraordinary importance on the seemingly unimportant.

And then there was the clock. A colossal chronometer, eighty feet wide, standing proud atop One Union Square South and overlooking the square as its stark digital display counted down in red, pixelated numbers. Most people didn’t look up.

A CLOCK FEW NOTICE AND FEWER UNDERSTAND

The clock is a warning of irreversible climate breakdown, yet so many just walked past. I saw a few people pause. Some asked questions. But the vast majority didn’t even notice. And those who did? Most had no idea what it was. Over and over again, this lack of engagement or understanding was what struck me most.

"Four years, 138 days left!" a young girl read out loud to her friends. "Until the world explodes, or what?" a boy retorted with a laugh. I made my way to their little cluster, their eyes fixed upward on the bold red digits. "Do you know what this clock stands for?" I asked. Four pairs of eyes turn toward me with curiosity. A New York University graduate student answered hesitantly, "Something to do with the climate crisis, I heard. But I’m not sure what exactly."

Of all the people I spoke with, only a small handful made the connection to climate change. Others offered guesses — national debt, conspiracy theories, doomsday predictions, maybe something to do with politics. A college student I met stood out. She observed longer than most, and when I explained what the clock meant, I saw something shift in her face. A moment of recognition. And with it, a quiet fear.

A CALL TO ACTION, AN ANXIOUS WARNING, SYMBOLISM: WHERE DOES THE CLOCK STAND?

I felt a mix of messages when I looked at the clock. As did the Union Square pedestrians I spoke with over several days. Knowledge of the climate crisis, when it arrives, doesn’t always bring clarity. Sometimes it brings paralysis. Some of the people I spoke with felt overwhelmed. Others laughed it off. A few dismissed it entirely. I kept wondering, can awareness alone spark change? Or does it need to be accompanied by something else such as trust, support, imagination?

I spoke with artist, writer, and curator Katie Peyton Hofstadter, the "art-fixer" behind the NYC Climate Clock. She told me she wasn’t sure how much the clock changed individual behavior, but she believed deeply in its symbolism. In a city where over 90% of the public monuments honor colonial conquests and military white men, a countdown to climate collapse will not change history but can shape the symbols that define our present. The Clock integrates climate consciousness into the cultural landscape, ensuring that the urgency of the climate crisis is a visible reminder within our daily life.

That conversation stayed with me. I had come to the story wanting to assess the clock's effect, to measure something. But maybe that is not the right lens. The Climate Clock isn’t a tool for persuasion or policy but a marker of cultural interruption.

Maybe some forms of climate work don’t live in direct outcomes, but in subtle reorientations. Maybe symbolism, when sustained and deliberate, moves more slowly but in deeper, systemic ways.

As I left Union Square one afternoon, I stopped to notice the everyday life unfolding around it. The Clock kept ticking above it all. I wondered how many others would look up.